COLUMN: USU playcalling suspect
Saturday, while essentially every USU student was donning some kind of costume at some kind of Halloween party, Diondre Borel was carving the secondary of No. 24-ranked Nevada for a career-high 399 passing yards.
The entire offense scored a season-high 42 points, made all the more impressive by the fact that USU was shutout during the entire first half before they unleashed that scoring barrage.
While it’s nice to see the that the team hasn’t given up on what is already a lost season, I am plenty curious to know where exactly this offense was against Fresno State, Louisiana Tech and San Diego State. Those games saw an Aggie offense that was overly conservative, compact, and largely ineffective.
Games such as Oklahoma, Idaho State and Nevada, the offense was run like a true spread offense, taking shots at the big plays and trusting the arm and decision-making of Borel.
It seems like a frustrating waste of how far Borel has come as a passer in his time at Utah State that the offense is seldom utilizing his abilities to make reads and throws that he has developed so well over his three years as the starting quarterback.
Also adding to that frustration is that if the Utah State offense had been as wide open in games against Fresno State and Louisiana Tech as it was against Nevada, the Aggies would probably be sitting at a 4-4 record right now, rather than 2-6, with a bowl game almost surely in the cross-hairs.
It leaves much to be desired in the play selection of offensive coordinator Dave Baldwin when wondering what this season could have truly been had he placed more trust in Borel throughout the year. We all know that the injuries to the majority of the superstars on offense have been devastating, but Saturday seemed to show that Borel can still make it happen out there, and on the road against a top 25 team, no less.
Keeping with the theme of Section F multitasking, I’d better touch on basketball’s first exhibition game, including the anticipated debuts of point guards Brockeith Pane and James Walker.
As expected, this game was not even close. Utah State dominated from start to finish, and didn’t appear to be shaky at all along the way. Despite Nate Bendall being out with injury, unfortunately for what looks to be an extended period of time, the Aggies dominated in the post, scoring at will, it seemed like. It also seemed like Brady Jardine was going to finish with 20 or more rebounds based on how many he pulled down in just the first several minutes.
Pane and Walker however, were getting their feet wet for the first time in a game running head coach Stew Morrill’s system, and they did so with flying colors. Pane finished with a team-leading 16 points on 5-8 shooting from the field to go along with one rebound, one assist and one steal in just 23 minutes of action.
Walker, who is adjusting to the point guard position for the first time on top of being a freshman, played just 14 minutes, but tallied six points and seven assists to go along with a defensive presence that was nothing short of stellar.
The team knows what it is getting out of players like Tai Wesley, Pooh Williams, Tyler Newbold and Brian Green, and each of those players continued to live up to their reputations and performance that have won the Aggies a Western Athletic Conference championship each of the past three years.
Another player, one who looks like he will be counted on much more than anticipated this season after Bendall’s injury, also stepped up in a big way in his Aggie debut. University of Utah transfer Morgan Grim played just 16 minutes, but still put 11 points on the board to go with his four rebounds. Grim, along with senior Matt Formisano, are suddenly the only options off the bench as far as big men are concerned for Morrill.
Keeping things in context, it was just Laval that the Aggies thrashed on Saturday, and this weekend will be just Grand Canyon as the next sacrificial lamb. Things are looking bright, though, for this season.
If all goes as planned, it should be a weekend of blowouts – for the basketball team Friday, followed by what should be a commanding victory Saturday in football, over New Mexico State.
Matt Sonnenberg is a senior majoring in print journalism. Matt is an avid fan of Aggie athletics and can be found on the front row of every home football and basketball game. He can also be reached at matt.sonn@aggiemail.usu.edu.